Day 1323

Today was one of those "nose to the grindstone" days. I methodically worked my way through a long list of simple tasks. Articles got written, websites got updated, and bills got paid. There was even a conference call, although since only one person showed up, it wasn't really much of a conference. The dogs had nothing to bark about today, and other than the faint sound of typing, the house was quiet as a tomb.

I got an adapter in the mail this afternoon that will allow me to attach a professional matte box to my video camera. The device would be a lot more useful if I actually had a matte box to attach, but I'll worry about that later. With few upcoming video jobs on the agenda, I've got plenty of time to find that matte box.

I'm beginning to wonder if social media is worth the effort. Without the leverage and large numbers that blog sharing sites like Entrecard and Adgitize used to provide, it's getting harder and harder to attract new readers. Even during its heyday, a lot of people dismissed Entrecard as mindless widget clicking. I liked it though. It brought thousands of new eyes to the blog every day and some ended up staying to become regular readers. Sure, it's easy enough to re-share blog posts on Facebook and Google+ but it's not that same thing as having lots of people come directly to the source. Probably my main problem with social media is that I'm not a very social person. I think the only reason I'm on Facebook at all is to try to lure people back here to the blog.

Maybe declining readership is just another sign of Summer. Everything seems to go through a decline in the Summer. It's getting hard to find flowers to photograph in the park these days. The season is over and almost all the flowers have dried and turned to seed. The grass in the back yard is looking a lot thinner too. Even though the yard was professionally landscaped early in the Spring, the Summer's thick canopy of Oak leaves prevents enough sun from getting to the grass. Essentially, even after a lot of effort, the yard looks just like it always does at the end of July.

At least Dot seems to be improving. She's got another acupuncture session tomorrow. The girl's got a pretty full dance card now with the combination of water therapy and acupuncture. I think the treatments are helping though. Dot was pretty spry on her walks today, even though it was a hot day in July with very few flowers to smell.

Penny is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day

Day 1059

It's amazing how often little things end up consuming large amounts of my time. I wanted to get November invoices out today. Everything was ready to take to the post office, but I couldn't get the envelopes to print. Printing envelopes used to be a piece of cake with older printers, but now I have one of those "multifunction" printers and one of the functions that Epson seems to have left out was envelopes. I can't just slide the envelopes into a little slot anymore. I have to take out the paper tray and reconfigure it for envelope sized pieces of paper. If I'm off on the dimensions by even a tiny amount, the envelopes get stuck and I practically have to take the printer apart to clear the paper jam.

Some of you might ask why I don''t just use the large format printer I'm always talking about instead. Nope. That won't work either. The large printer won't even accept something as small as an envelope in the paper tray. Although I could have hand addressed all the envelopes much quicker, I persevered and finally got the multifunction printer to work. As I drove to the post office with the envelopes, I kept thinking that this was a lot of work for the small amount that I actually billed out this month.

I wonder if any of my Entrecard friends are noticing that their blog traffic continues to slowly drop long after the demise of the Entrecard network. That's what seems to be happening with me. For the first time in years, my blog traffic is actually lower than my company website traffic. If you're a regular reader who has never signed up to become a regular blog follower, humor me and sign up now. It won't change anything, but it will make me feel better.

I got an e-mail today with an ad for a low cost film scanner that records directly to an SD card. No computer required. I have a fantastic old Canon scanner, but I haven't been able to use it for years, since it hooks up using a SCSI cable. Jeez, how long has it been since you've used a computer with SCSI peripherals?  I don't even own one anymore. At any rate, I may get this new little film scanner. I've still got thousands of 35mm negatives that I've never digitized yet. Maybe when I can't think of any new ideas, I'll at least be able to retrieve some really good old ones. I continue to think that I shot some of my very best photos in the 1970's. I can't remember what they were though. It would be interesting to scan these old negatives and see if they can hold their own with the stuff I'm doing today.  We'll see.

Spot is today's Dalmatian of the Day

Watch of the Day